fixated on transferring information and objects across large distances and they forged connections with a wide array of practitioners in order to do so. Plants, too, were considered central to economic development, and botanical collectors were often commissioned to work on schemes intended to further imperial aspirations. This paper discusses two aspects of eighteenth-century botanical collecting. Firstly, it assesses the activities of French botanical collectors in the Indian Ocean, examining their work in relation to that of other imperial powers. Secondly, the paper considers the examples discussed above from a historiographical perspective, to question what (if anything) microhistorical studies can offer more broadly to global history.